


Troubles of the Mind

by Sand_wolf579



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Electroconvulsive Therapy, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Instability, Mental Institutions, Minor Injuries, Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 22:16:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20071489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sand_wolf579/pseuds/Sand_wolf579
Summary: Mick didn't want to deal with his issues head on, he would rather just pretend that they didn't exist at all, or run away from them when things got too serious. But how was he supposed to run away from his own dark thoughts?





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, so this is yet another attempt of mine to get more Mick stories out there. Seriously, that guy has it rough and he needs more love, both in the show and outside of it. Mick's younger in this story, about seventeen. It takes place just after he burns his family's home down.  
Also, I originally wrote this story before we learned more about Mick's family, so it's not completely accurate (I gave him siblings), but I don't think it's that big of a deal.

A pounding headache was the first thing that alerted Mick that he was conscious. It was painful, made remembering things a pain in the ass, and was definitely not the funnest way there was to wake up, but it was actually something that he was used to. Mick used to sneak out and get drunk all the time, and even though the hangovers were an absolute pain, the numb feeling that the alcohol brought was well worth the annoyance.

Yes, Mick had been drunk a number of times...and even with his head pounding so harshly that he could barely think coherently, he knew that this wasn't what a hangover felt like. This was something else. He didn't know what it was exactly, but he knew that much.

Mick tried to drag his hand to his head to make an ultimately useless attempt to ease the pain in his skull, but the slight movement caused his body to flare up painfully. Even if it didn't hurt, he still wouldn't have been able to move his hand far enough. He could barely move it a few inches before it was stopped in its tracks. If Mick had to take a guess, he would say that he was handcuffed to a bed.

And chances were, it wasn't in the fun way.

The longer Mick laid there, awake but with his eyes still closed, the more the rest of his senses came back to him. The next things Mick noticed was actually the last clue he needed. He could distinctly smell the fake cleanliness of the room. It smelled strongly of bleach, like a hospital.

Or like an infirmary.

Mick realized where he was. The distinct smell of a hospital/infirmary, as well as the fact that he was handcuffed to a bed told him that he was in the juvie's infirmary.

...right, he was in juvie right now. Kinda a strange thing to forget about. Mick suddenly remembered why he hated concussions so much. They messed with his head and made thinking and remembering things even more difficult than it already was...oh yeah, a concussion. _That _was why his head was hurting like a bitch, not because of a hangover. He should have known. Mick had gotten his fair share of concussions before.

Now, the question was, how did he end up with a freaking concussion in the first place?

Actually, Mick realized that he already knew the answer to that. There had been a fight, no surprise there. Fights happen all the time in juvie, and Mick himself wasn't exactly the most hesitant person to join in on the fun. But this time had been different somehow. Mick remembered there being uneven odds. Somebody had a shiv. And there was this kid. This young, small, stupid kid.

After remembering that kid Mick felt a surge of unexplainable protectiveness come over him. Suddenly he wanted, no, _needed _to know where this kid was and if he was okay. Mick forced his eyes opened and immediately regretted it. If there was one thing he always seemed to forget about hangovers and concussions alike it was that they caused a sensitivity to light.

Mick groaned and it felt like his headache just tripled in intensity. Stupid lights. Stupid him for not remembering that this would happen.

"Maybe not your brightest idea ever." Pain or no pain, Mick's eyes snap open at the sound of the all too familiar voice that he just couldn't place.

Mick turned towards the voice and when his eyes were focused enough that he could actually see properly he was a little thrown off by what he saw. There, sitting on the bed next to him, not even handcuffed to it, was the scrawny kid that he had saved. Somehow, the kid didn't look very beat up. Actually, Mick felt like _he_ was in even worse shape than the kid was.

"Who the hell are you?" Mick asked. The kid smirked slightly, though there was a hesitant and almost pain filled look in his eyes.

"Leonard Snart." The kid said, and something about the name just sounded so familiar, and yet so wrong at the same time.

"Leo, huh?" Mick felt like he should know that name. The kid's eyes flashed...something, but he didn't say anything.

"Sure, call me whatever you want, Mick." Leo said. Mick frowned slightly in confusion. Had he told the kid his name? Huh. He must have. Except...he really didn't think he had. Mick was just about to ask how Leo seemed to know who he was, but at that moment the doctor entered. She was an okay looking lady, but not somebody that Mick would look at twice in a crowd.

Mick hated hospitals and everything similar to them, but he had enough experience with them to know that everything would go smoother for everybody if he just sat still and answered questions. Mick kept his hands (And his eyes) to himself as the doctor gave him a quick look over.

"Well, Rory, it looks like you're good to go here." She handed him some pain medication, which he gladly took. "Do you have any feelings of nausea?" Mick shook his head. His head was still hurting like hell, but he wasn't feeling even the least bit sick. He kinda got off lucky this time. "Well, tell the guards if there's any change," (Like they would care.) "And I don't want to see you in here again, got it?"

"Got it." Mick muttered, though they both knew he would probably be back within a week. Mick had a tendency of getting into fights. Either he irked somebody and they attacked him, he would get annoyed with somebody else and punch them in the face, or he would see a fight already going on and wanted a piece of the action. Whatever the case, Mick was pretty much a regular in the infirmary.

Mick held out his hand and waited impatiently as the guard who came in behind the doctor uncuffed him from the bed, and then moved the handcuffs so they were on both of his wrists instead. The guard wasn't all that gentle in getting Mick to move, but he was pretty much used to that by now. It was extremely rare to find a gentle prison or juvie guard. They were an extremely rare species.

It was only when the guard had practically pulled Mick out of the room did he realize that neither of the adults had even spared a glance in Leo's direction. "Hey, what about-" But the guard wasn't hearing it. He scowled and gave Mick a completely unnecessary shove, sending the message that he wasn't supposed to be talking, for some reason. As Mick left he looked back to see Leo right where he had been before, watching him. He only bothered to face forward again when Leo was out of sight.

Even though it was dinner time, Mick was lead straight back to his cell. Normally he would complain, he hated missing a meal, but he didn't bother this time. First off, because he knew the guard wouldn't take him to the mess hall when dinner would only last for a few more minutes. Second off, his concussion was really not making the thought of food very appealing.

Mick was locked back in his cell and not for the first he found himself extremely grateful that he wasn't stuck bunking with anybody. He didn't do sharing. Even though he could feel his stomach rumbling in protest, he actually was kinda hungry, Mick laid face down on the bottom bunk of the bed. He knew that he had just barely woken up, but damn it all, his head was hurting and he just wanted to sleep.

As he was beginning to doze off Mick briefly tried to remember whether sleep was good or bad for a concussion...eh, who cared? Mick certainly didn't, he was too tired.

He would figure out whether this was a mistake or not after a quick nap.

* * *

Mick slowly woke up a few hours later. His head was throbbing painfully, but it was much more bearable than the pounding he had been dealing with before. Mick pulled himself onto his elbow and looked around, still half asleep. It was dark, and extremely quiet, with the only sound being the guard who was making his late night rounds. Everybody else was likely asleep.

Mick was considering rolling over and joining them, but he didn't when he remembered just _why _he had woken up. Mick had had a nightmare, a beautiful, horrifying and extremely vivid nightmare…One that he couldn't remember at all. He thought there was something to do with a fire in it, or maybe it had been a nightmare about being back on his family's farmhouse, which really would be a nightmare. Whatever his bad dream had been about, all Mick knew was that it had felt extremely real.

"You look like you had a good sleep." A sarcastic, bored, and extremely familiar voice drawled. Mick about jumped out of his skin and ended up hitting his head on the bunk above him.

"Damn." Mick groaned and doubled forward, his hands on top of his head. Ow. As if his head hadn't already been sore enough as it was. He turned his head and glared to the side where he saw that punk head from the infirmary leaning down from the top bunk, smirking at him.

"You have a bad dream?" The brat asked in a patronizing, mocking tone. Mick scowled. He hated it when people talked to him like that. His older brothers used to do it all the time. For some reason that thought caused a dark, painful, and almost completely hopeless feeling to come over him.

...Used to.

"Shut up." Mick shoved his pillow roughly in Leo's face. He quickly regretted it because now the kid had his only pillow and Mick was still exhausted. He wouldn't give Leo the satisfaction of asking/demanding for his pillow back, so Mick decided to just use his arm as a pillow. He lay down with his back to the kid, and even though it wasn't the most comfortable position, Mick had dealt with worse.

He had only been lying there for a moment when he heard creaking from the top bunk. An instant later there was a light thud as Leo jumped from his bed to the floor. Mick didn't know what he was up to, maybe he was just taking a piss, but he really couldn't care less. He just wanted to sleep.

That idea went out the window when he felt his bed sink in slightly as Leo sat down at the edge of it. "...Do you want to talk about it?"

No, he didn't. Why would he want to talk about something that he couldn't even remember? Especially when that something was so personal, and the person asking was a kid that he barely knew.

"I _can't _talk about it." Mick said quietly. "Even if I wanted to talk about it, I don't remember." He wondered why he wasn't growling or grumbling at the kid like he usually would. Mick was not a quiet or gentle talker, so what was with him using that tone now? Was it just because it was so late and he was tired? No, that couldn't be it, because Mick got even more irritable when he was tired.

The kid 'h'mmed' thoughtfully. Mick heard a quiet click that he immediately recognized. All of his fatigue seemed to go away in an instant as Mick lifted his head and turned to see the kid holding a lighter with a small, flickering flame.

Mick's lighter.

He desperately wanted to snatch the lighter away, snap it shut, and throw it out of the cell without a second thought, though he wasn't sure why he would even want to do that. But he couldn't. The flame was just so beautiful, he couldn't tear his eyes away from it. The fire was just so small, so enticing, so harmless.

...harmless. No fire was harmless. As if to remind himself of that Mick held his hand over the flame. He could feel the heat burn his already red and blistering hand. It hurt like hell, but he didn't have even the slightest desire to pull away. Maybe this burning feeling, this pain, was exactly what he deserved.

Besides, if it was so wrong for him to be doing this, then why was Leo just watching him, almost as though he approved? It was only after a few minutes had passed did Leo speak up about it.

"Maybe you should take a break for now." He suggested. "You don't want the guard's getting suspicious." Mick reluctantly closed the lighter that he must've taken from Leo at some point, because he knew the kid had a point. He could watch the flames lick at his skin all night, but if any guard got wise to what he was doing his lighter would be confiscated, and then where would he be?

"Get out of my business, kid." Mick growled grumpily. Just because Leo was right and they were now cellmates did not mean that Mick wanted to hear what he wanted to say. Actually, were they even cellmates. When had that happened? "What are you even doing here?"

"You don't see me asking you why _you're _in juvie." Leo said, which caused Mick to pause. That wasn't what he had asked...actually, why was he in prison? Mick felt like he should know this, but he really didn't want to think about it. When he did start to think about it...no, he didn't want to. The ugly feeling in his gut just wasn't worth it. So Mick stopped trying to think about it. He just avoided it all together.

And in his opinion the best way to avoid something, whether it was unwanted thoughts or chores, was by sleeping.

Mick roughly kicked the kid off his bed, snatched his pillow from off the floor (he was lucky the kid hadn't claimed it for himself) rolled over and tried to fall asleep. He could hear Leo getting up off the floor and climb up to his own bed. The cell was silent for a few minutes and Mick had nearly fallen asleep when he heard Leo speak to him one more time from the upper bunk.

"Nobody here is innocent, Micky, we all have our demons to live with." Leo said in that stupid, condescending voice of his that Mick couldn't help but listen to. "The question is, are you going to ignore them, or embrace them?"

The thing was, Mick had no idea. He _really_ wanted to just ignore and forget about his problems, but something told him that wouldn't work very well. Was the only other option to embrace his inner darkness?

Mick didn't really want to do that either, but he didn't think that he actually had a choice. With that cheerful thought Mick fell asleep. Once again he found himself having dreams filled with fire, fear, amazement and pain. Dreams that he, once again, couldn't remember after he woke up.

* * *

The next few days Mick found himself with a stalker. That Leo kid always seemed to be following him around everywhere he went. The brat always insisted on shooting his mouth off and saying things that were either sarcastic or made Mick think about something that he would rather forget about.

Needless to say, Mick found the kid annoying and just wished that he could get rid of him...at the same time though, he didn't. He still had that same feeling of fierce protectiveness towards the kid. He didn't know why, but considering it was the only real feeling other than numb boredom or anger that Mick had had since he had been sent to juvie, he was willing to roll with it.

Mick had known from the start that keeping the kid from getting himself killed was going to be a very difficult challenge. He was young, probably barely even fourteen, and was likely the smallest kid in there. As if that wasn't bad enough, the kid had a mouth on him to rival anyone else's. Leo wasn't afraid to let his opinion be known, which Mick might have admired if the kid was tough enough to protect himself from any heat he would get because people didn't like what he said.

Mick didn't like playing the part of a bodyguard, but...well, he did like heat. Besides, what else was he supposed to do, let his cellmate get kill? Sure, kids died in juvie all the time, and it hadn't really bothered Mick before, but for some reason it made him sick to his stomach to think of the same thing happening to Leo.

Luckily, he really didn't have to worry about the kid nearly as much as he thought he would. For some reason Leo was left alone. No matter how many snarky comments he made, he was ignored by _everybody_. The guards didn't try to intimidate him, the other kids didn't try to threaten him. It was as though nobody seemed to know that Leo even existed.

Honestly though, Mick was more than fine with that. It certainly made his job easier. A small part of him wondered _why_ though. Nobody, especially not someone like Leo, can fly so far under the radar in juvie. It just didn't happen. Mick was curious about why nobody was giving Leo a hard time, but he didn't really question it that much. Mick really wasn't big on overthinking things. He left that to people like Leo.

Mick just contented himself with thinking that nobody dared to mess with Leo because they didn't dare to mess with _him_. After all, Mick was a fairly intimidating guy, even if he wasn't the oldest, strongest or biggest person there he had still made a bit of a reputation for himself. Everybody here knew what he could do with fire, and it was fairly common knowledge that he had gotten his hands on a lighter, which he could do a lot of damage with.

Mick wasn't exactly sure _how _his obsession with fire had become a thing that everybody was aware of, but he didn't worry much about it. He would be crazy to complain about people knowing about his 'little' obsession when it was probably the only thing keeping them off his back for just being a dimwitted farm boy.

Mick knew better than to question why things were going easy for him and Leo. He wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth...even though that was one thing that his father had actually taught him to _always _do. What could he say? His dad was a picky, stubborn bastard farmer who would _never _accept anything less than perfection, even if that something was a gift...or a son...or, hell, even _five _sons. The man was never satisfied.

Yep, his dad was definitely a bastard.

And Mick refused to be anything like him, so yeah, he was absolutely willing to accept things at face value. It wasn't as though he was smart enough to actually figure out how to dig into things, and he definitely wasn't motivated enough to do so.

So, yeah, until the real reason for things was spelled out for him, Mick was going to continue to hang out with Leo and appreciate that nobody seemed to have it out for him.

Mick was usually with Leo, because the kid always happened to be wherever he was...most of the time. There were a number of times though when Mick couldn't find Leo anywhere, no matter where he looked. This had worried him those first few days, because he thought something might happen, but he stopped worrying as he got used to it. Leo always came back to him, though it was kind of annoying that he never told Mick where he went when he was gone. Oh, and that he always seemed to disappear and reappear out of freaking nowhere. Mick could do without that.

Things seemed to go smoothly, almost too smoothly, for about a month before anything happened. The long break had caused Mick to get cocky, weak. Fortunately for him, growing up with three older brothers had taught him to never fully let his guard down. He was able to tense up right away when six punks, the same ones that had jumped Leo his first day in, surrounded Mick as he was eating his lunch in the mess hall.

Mick wasn't wimp enough to be even the least bit intimidated by these guys. It's not like they could hurt Leo, because he wasn't even there (Mick had long since stopped worrying about where he ran off to). He didn't even consider that they were here just for him. Mick was just irritated that they were cutting into his food time.

Mick didn't even look at the guys, but not in a 'I'm-scared-please-don't-hurt-me' way but in a 'you're-not-even-worth-my-time' kind of way. Sometimes that kind of approach caused people to get bored easily and leave, but not this time. Bradley "Mangler" Patrick (Yeah, Mick thought that it was a stupid name too) sat himself next to Mick and leaned in close, smirking like he knew something that he didn't.

Mick hated that look. Leo gave it to him all the time.

"What do you want, Mangler?" Mick asked grumpily. He was _oh _so tempted to call him 'Bradley', but he had decided against it. That would just get him a ticket to the infirmary, and Mick really wasn't in the mood for that today.

"We just thought you looked lonely over here." Mangler said in a tone that clearly said that he was up to something. "Come on, j-cat, where's your friend?"

Mick stiffened. So this _was _about Leo. If these idiots thought he would let them hurt the kid, they had another thing...wait a second, had Mangler just called him '_j-cat'?_

"What?" Mick broke his rule of not even looking at these guys. He glared at Mangler in disbelief and confusion. "What did you just call me?" Mick didn't exactly consider himself fluent in prison slang, but he _did _know what j-cat meant, and he wasn't one. "And why should you care where Leo is?"

For some reason, that just made Mangler and his cronies laugh hysterically, as if he had just delivered the punch line to the greatest joke in the world.

"Oh my god," Mangler wiped away a fake tear, which just infuriated Mick even more. What was so goddamn funny?! "You seriously have no idea. Rory, you really are a j-cat."

"I am not!" Mick shoved Mangler away from him and got to his feet. "Just because I hang out with some kid does not mean that I'm...that!"

"See, that's the best part." Mangler stood up and Mick was loath to notice how much taller than him Mangler was. "You've been talking to this 'Leo' for _weeks_ now, and you can't even see what is right in front of you. _Everybody_ in here knows it, except you."

"Knows what?" Mick spat, even as he briefly cast his eyes around and noticed that they were being watched. Everybody in juvie loved a good fight, and they were all probably at the edge of their seats, waiting for things to escalate. The weird thing was, so many people were looking at Mick as though he was the butt of some stupid joke. The few who weren't looking at him like that almost had a look of pity on their face, which Mick somehow hated even more.

Mangler could tell that he had a captive audience, and he reveled in it. The jerk leaned even closer to Mick so they were nose to nose. "That your little friend, Leo, _doesn't exist."_

Mick reacted on instinct. He took a step back, which just got Mangler smirking, probably because he thought that Mick was running or something. He wasn't. He just wanted more room so he could give that bastard the punch in the face that he deserved. There was a loud crack when Mick's first came in contact with Mangler's face, followed immediately by a sharp cry of pain as the idiot tried to staunch the sudden blood flow.

Never before had Mick found it so satisfying to break somebody's nose. Still, he wasn't satisfied yet. Mick clenched at Mangler's shirt and pulled him forward, so they were eye to eye. Mick glared at him darkly, but Mangler was still chuckling slightly, which was absolutely infuriating. Mick had broken his freakin' nose, and this guy was _still _laughing at him?! Let him have just a few more hits and they would see who would be laughing then.

"What the _hell _are you talking about?" Mick growled.

"You really are a j-cat." Mangler spat blood out of his mouth. "You really haven't noticed that this Leo kid has never even _talked _to anybody else before?"

Actually, Mick had noticed that. He just hadn't thought much of it. Leo just didn't like to socialize, so what? "That doesn't mean anything." The dozens of sniggers around the mess hall told him that many people seemed to think otherwise. Well, wasn't that just fan-freaking-tastic? All Mick had wanted was to eat his lunch in peace, and now people were watching him like he was the freaking entertainment.

"So talking to things that aren't really there doesn't mean anything?" Some random kid in the crowd muttered. He was only a year or two older than Leo, and had even arrived the same day. "Sure, j-cat."

Mick snarled. There was no way he was going to let some random fish get away with disrespecting him like that. Mick let go of Mangler's shut and lunged towards the kid. Before anybody could blink he had smashed the kid's head into the table, knocking him right out. Mick got the brief satisfaction of seeing the unconscious kid's head bleed before he was rammed into from the side.

Mick recovered quickly and punched his attacker in the ribs. If a fight was what these idiots wanted, then it's what they were going to get! Mick didn't even care that it was basically every single inmate against him, he would still take them on. And if he didn't win, then he certainly was going to cause hell for as many of these guys as he could.

It didn't take long for the guards (where the _hell_ had they been?) to get word of the fight and step in to break it up. Most of the kids backed down when the guards came in, but not Mick. He was too pissed off and hyped up on adrenalin to even care about the guards. He was too busy trying to smash Mangler's face in.

It took three different guards to pull a struggling Mick off of a barely conscious Mangler, and it was quickly decided that he was too unstable at the moment to be put in his regular cell. Without even having to talk about it, or even discuss it with the higher ups of the juvie, the guards dragged Mick kicking and screaming to solitary confinement.

Mick was thrown unceremoniously into a dark, solitary cell and locked in. Mick was still feeling extremely pissed off and had a bunch of aggression that he still needed to burn off. He needed to hit something, somebody, and actually cause some damage. Throwing a fit with no consequences wouldn't do him any good. After a minute or two of punching and shouting at the door, Mick gave up trying to get out. He would have to find another way to get rid of his frustration.

And he knew exactly how to do it.

Mick sat down on the floor, his back against the door, and took out his lighter. He was lucky the guards had been in such a rush to get him locked up, that they had forgotten to search for contraband. Mick flicked open the lighter and clicked it to get a little flame going. Mick stared at it for a minute before holding it out under his bloody and sore hand.

Mick hissed in pain as he felt the fire dance under his already sensitive skin, but he didn't pull away. This was a good pain, one that distracted him from unwanted thoughts that were caused by stupid idiots who thought they knew everything.

It was also a pain that he knew he deserved. Fire was dangerous and destructive, and this was just the reminder that Mick needed of that fact. Fire always needed something to burn, and he figured that for as long as it was him who was burning, nobody else would.

Mick sat alone in the darkness, with the small fire as his only source of light and his own hisses of pain as the only sound. He could still feel the pain from the burns, but somehow he didn't _feel_ the pain, or register it as such. Because pain was bad, and this wasn't. The fire and the burning wasn't bad, _he _was.

Some people said that fire was only as dangerous as the person who was controlling it, but that didn't make Mick feel any better about it, because _he _was the one who had the flame in his hands, and he was _definitely _dangerous, even when he didn't want to be. Besides, no flame could be _controlled_, and only idiots believed that they could.

Mick had once been an idiot.

He had lost control of a fire. That was why he was here…

Mick clenched his lighter tighter in his hand and brought the flame even closer to his palm in an attempt to burn away the pain. He did _not _want to think about that, not now, not ever. It was best just to ignore that it had ever happened in the first place.

"Really, Micky?" A familiar, snarky voice came out of the darkness. Mick lifted his eyes and stared in shock. Leo was standing right in front of him, but how could he? Mick was in solitary, he should be the only person allowed in here. Leo had definitely not been in here earlier, and Mick had been leaning against the door the whole time, so it wasn't as though he had gotten in that way.

"Leo, what're you-" Mick pushed himself further against the wall, suddenly feeling the urge to get away from Leo.

The younger boy scowled, his look much darker than it had ever been before. "You really haven't learned your lesson?" Leo squatted down so that he was at Mick's eye level. "When you play with fire, somebody's going to get burned.

"Why should you care?" Mick frowned and turned his eyes back to the flame. "You've seen me burn myself before, and you weren't bothered then."

"Who said I was worried about _you?_" Leo said in a nasty tone that just didn't sound right. "Anybody who's around you is at risk because of your obsession. Me, the guards, the inmates...your family."

"Shut up." Mick muttered. He clenched his fists tightly. He didn't want to hear this.

"They're _dead_ because of you, Micky." Leo said darkly.

Mick couldn't take it any more. "Shut up!" He screamed and threw his lighter at Leo...except his so called friend wasn't there. He had disappeared entirely and Mick's lighter clattered harmlessly against the floor.

Mick cast his eyes around uneasily, but he saw no signs of his friend. He wasn't in there...and he probably hadn't been in the first place. He had just imagined Leo being there. Mick knew that that was true, but...it just didn't seem possible. Leo had been right in front of him, he had heard his voice crystal clear. Had he really just imagined it?

A terrifying thought came to Mick's mind. If he had just now imagined Leo being there, who was to say that he hadn't been hallucinating him the whole time? Mick felt his stomach clench painfully and he felt like he was going to be sick. Had he...had Leo just been a hallucination this whole time?

He wanted to say no, but...he really wasn't sure. What Mangler had said earlier, and the fact that Leo was always disappearing and reappearing out of thin air told Mick that Leo wasn't actually real, but…But it had _felt _so real. Is it possible to hallucinate something so clearly? And what if Leo was real and everything else was the hallucination?

Mick really wasn't sure what was real and what wasn't anymore.

Oh, god, Mangler was right. Mick really _was _a j-cat.

He really was insane.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a different kind of chapter, and I've never written anything in this style before, so we'll just have to see how it turns out. Italicized means that it's Mick's writings in his journal basically. In between his journal entries will be different experiences that relate to the writings either before or after it.
> 
> Warnings: This chapter will include talk about and treatment of mental illness. I'm trying to portray how it would have been in the early 90s, but it's hard to find any information, so if it's inaccurate, that's my bad. Also, there will probably be one or two uses of the word 'retard'. I absolutely hate that word, but it's something that was probably said by teenagers 25 years ago, so...yeah, be prepared for that.

_I thought that juvie had been bad, but somehow this place is even worse. I haven't even been here a full day and I already hate it._

"Rory, come on, it's lights out now." The guard said...well, he wasn't technically a guard, but that was what Mick called him because his job seemed to be a mix between a juvie guard and a nurse that hovered around all the time. Whatever he was, Mick already didn't like him. Still, he did as he was told.

"Sure thing, boss." Mick said, his voice full of sarcasm. Mick closed up the notebook that they had given him (he absolutely _refused_ to call it a diary or even a journal) and tucked it under his pillow. The guard nodded and moved on to convince one of Mick's roommates that yes, it was time for bed, and no, they couldn't leave the lights on. It took almost five minutes to convince the kid to agree to sleep with the light off like a normal person, and the way that the 'negotiation' happened told Mick that this was a nightly thing...awesome.

Mick groaned and laid back on his bed, with his back towards everybody else as he tried block out all of the pointless noise going on behind him. He couldn't believe he was actually thinking it, but he wished he was back in juvie. At least he understood how things worked there. He knew where he stood. _Here_ though...Mick barely even had an idea of what he was doing here or what would happen to him, and the uncertainty was unnerving.

Really, Mick should have known that today would be bad when he had been jerked awake by a juvie guard harshly pounding on his cell door, saying that he was being taken to see the warden. First off, waking up in solitary was never a good thing. Secondly, in Mick's experience being woken up was just about the worst way to start the day off. Even if he was just woken up a few minutes before he would have woken up naturally, it still basically ruined his morning and left him feeling pissed off and exhausted for the rest of the day. And thirdly, when was seeing the warden ever a good thing?

The thing was, it hadn't been the warden who had wanted to talk to Mick, it had been some random guy who had said he was a doctor. Mick hadn't known what the doctor guy had wanted with him, and he had no idea why the warden was allowing and/or supporting this. He hadn't heard of something like this happening before.

Mick didn't like the doctor. The doc seemed solely interested in asking him invasive questions about literally everything that Mick didn't want to think about. He asked about the incident in the mess hall. He asked Leo. He asked about Mick's relationship with the other inmates. He asked about Mick's relationship with his _family._ What living on his family's farm had been like. They talked about it all.

It didn't take too long for Mick to realize that he was talking to a shrink or something. Once he figured that out though he realized that something was bothering him about this. Psychiatrists and people like that were supposed to try to 'cure' people of mental problems, and almost everybody Mick had had any interactions with thought that he was mentally unstable because of his slightly unhealthy fondness of fire.

The thing was, while the doc seemed interested in Mick's obsession with fire, he was _much _more fascinated by Leo and Mick's thoughts about his family. The doc kept on asking questions on top of questions about his family and friend, and Mick hadn't exactly understood why.

The two had ended up talking for a few hours, and Mick quickly found the whole process to be extremely boring. Finally, _finally,_ he was told that he was done. Except, nope, that was a lie. They didn't take Mick back to solitary or his cell. Instead they just made him wait in the hallway with a guard watching him like a hawk while the doc 'had a few words' with the warden...their 'little chat' lasted for _another _hour, and Mick was stuck waiting the entire time.

Needless to say, he did not have a very good start of the day, and things only got worse from their.

It turned out that the doc wasn't just any shrink, no, he was a shrink at a nut-house. After just a few hours worth of conversations the doc seemed to be sure that Mick would 'benefit' from receiving treatment at their facility. The warden of course had no objections. After all, juvies were crowded enough as they were. Any warden would probably jump at the chance to get rid of a mentally unstable kid or two. It would make things slightly less chaotic and crowded.

And that was how Mick had ended up at this dump with the other people that society had deemed unstable. The second that Mick had walked through the front doors he had been stripped of what little personal belongings he _did _have. Apparently one of the rules in this place was if he wanted his things back, he needed to cooperate with what these people wanted.

Mick didn't have all that many belongings that he could actually call his own, but he _hated_ the clothes that they provided for him and longed for his real clothes. He wanted to at least get his vest back, so until then Mick supposed he could play their little game...for now.

Mick frowned and slid a hand under his pillow so he could make sure that his notebook was still there. Doc had given it to him a little while ago, said that tomorrow they were going to be starting some treatment and it may affect his memories a little bit, which Mick was a little (really) worried about. The doc had said that his memories probably won't all be affected, only the more recent ones, and he _should _be able to remember them again after a reminder, which was what the notebook was for.

Mick looked over his shoulder to double check that nobody was watching him before pulling his notebook out from under his pillow. He didn't want to risk having it be confiscated, but _they _had been the ones to give him the notebook in the first place, and he was damn well going to use it. Pencil in hand Mick scrawled out a last hurried sentence in his notebook.

_Tomorrow my so called 'treatment begins', so if my brain ends up getting fried, that's why._

* * *

"This isn't going to hurt, is it?" Mick asked in what he asked was a casual voice, but on the inside he was feeling anything but casual. It almost literally felt like there was a pit of dread in his stomach. Mick liked to think that he was a pretty fearless guy. He didn't get nervous about the same things that most other kids were worried about. Right then though, Mick was feeling absolutely terrified.

"No, it won't." The doctor replied. He was a different doctor than Doctor Shrink. This guy was actually a true blue medical doctor...who made his living off of electrocuting people. The doctor was casually looking over some last minute things before they began his 'treatment'. "You won't feel a thing.

"I won't feel myself being electrocuted?" Mick dead-panned.

"You will be put under anesthesia." The doctor answered. "You won't feel yourself falling asleep, and by the time you wake up it will all be over." That is, until Mick's next treatment session that was scheduled for two days from now.

"What if something goes wrong and I _don't _end up waking up?" Mick asked. He thought it was a fair question. Electrocution was a method of execution, so obviously it had to be useful for killing people? What if they just had it set for too high a voltage or something?

"The chances of that happening are exceptionally low." The doctor said as he pushed a needle thing that was filled with...something into his arm. "But if it does, you won't even know it, will you?"

That wasn't a very reassuring thought. Still, for some crazy reason (maybe he really was insane) Mick didn't leave. The thought barely even crossed his mind. It wasn't like he had anywhere to go back to if he left this place. At least if he stayed here and the doctors did what they said they would he wouldn't have to deal with hallucination boys or flame filled nightmares.

For all Mick knew, this really would work, and if it didn't...well, it wasn't like he had anything to lose from trying.

"Hit me with your best shot." Mick muttered under his breath as he closed his eyes and tried to relax. He wasn't sure if the doctor heard him, and he didn't care because his words weren't really for the man's ears. "I'm not gonna let myself be beaten by a baby spark...or a fake teenager."

No matter how terrifying that baby spark was, or just how real Leo felt to him, Mick wasn't going to give in to them. He couldn't.

* * *

_I think somebody told me that electroconvulsive therapy (which is a stupid name, by the way. Why is it that whenever scientists come up with a new idea they name it the stupidest and most confusing thing in the world?) wouldn't hurt at all. They might have been right, but they also could have been wrong. The thing is, I can barely remember what had happened, let alone if I had been in pain at the time. Even now as I'm writing this I still feel kinda mentally _ _numb. Is it a side effect of the treatment, or is it just me?_

_I kinda feel like it's just me._

* * *

He woke up without even realizing that he had been asleep in the first place. It didn't really feel like waking up, more like he was just becoming aware. Like he was just realizing that he did actually exist. It was such a strange feeling, and it took a few moments for him to realize that somebody was talking to him.

"Mick, I need you to answer me." He blinked a few times and groaned when he realized that whoever was talking was addressing him. He guessed that meant he was Mick...wasn't that something he should have known?

"Wha'?" Mick asked groggily.

"How are you feeling?" The question sounded nice, but the person saying it sounded pretty annoyed. "Any chills? A fever?"

"No." Mick closed his eyes and frowned. "Sore." And his head was hurting...actually, not it wasn't hurting, it just felt kinda empty. Like, seriously empty. He still had thoughts and such, but they were all jumbled up and barely coherent. He felt like he had gotten into a fight or something, but he didn't remember doing anything like that...actually, he didn't really remember anything.

"Can' 'member." Mick muttered. He frowned and felt his breath catch in his throat. Why wouldn't he remember things? Who was talking to him? What was he doing here...and where was here."

"Calm down." The person spoke again. Mick opened his eyes and looked at the woman in front of him. He didn't know who she was (did he?) but she looked nice enough and didn't seem to be worried, and her calmness helped to calm him slightly. "Temporary memory loss is a regular side effect after the treatment you received."

Treatment? _Memory loss?!_ What the heck had happened to him? The woman could probably see the discomfort on his face. Calmly she approached a table to the side and picked up a notebook. She handed it to him.

"Your psychiatrist said this should help you remember." She said. Mick frowned and opened the notebook. Not much was written in it, just a couple of sentences, but looking at the words Mick actually remembered writing it.

"It's mine." Mick mumbled to himself. "psychiatrist...Doctor Shrink." The events of the day before came back to him. He looked at the woman. "Why am I in a crazy house?"

The woman frowned. "This is not a crazy house. It's simply a place to treat people who are suffering from mental illness, like yourself."

Mick scowled. Mental illness? Was this woman saying he was retarded? Before he could even think to get angry at her for it the woman was straightening up. "I have some other patients to check on. Just sit here and recover for a bit and we'll get your back to your room later." She left without another word, leaving Mick to sort out his own thoughts.

Mick frowned and looked back at the notebook in his hands. The woman said that he had gone through some kind of treatment, and even though he had absolutely no memories of it he did remember what it was. Elec...electro...conversation? Converse? Impulsive? The right word just wasn't coming to him, so Mick just called it electroshock therapy, because that was what it was.

But why had he gotten it? Mick had heard of people getting the crazy shocked out of them, but he didn't really know if that was what it actually was or what people thought it was. Either way, it was some kind of treatment for mental illness or whatever, and _he _was getting the treatment...did that mean that he was sick? Insane?

He didn't feel like he was, but really he wasn't sure. Was he crazy and hadn't even realized it? Was there a way for him to be uncrazy so he could go back to his normal life?

Had his life ever been normal in the first place?

* * *

_On the days that I don't have 'treatment' I have to talk to Doctor Shrink. I don't know which days mess with my head more. After I have a treatment I spend the rest of the day feeling like my brain has been emptied. I have a hard time remembering things and just wish I could have my memories back. On the days I talk to Doctor Shrink he makes me think about things that I would _rather _forget about. It's kinda funny that I either want to remember everything, or wish I could forget about it all. I think I remember one of my brothers (can't remember which one) saying that that sort of thing was called 'irony'._

_I don't really care what it's called. Why can't my brain just stop screwing with me and let me feel okay about anything?_

* * *

"Mick, we've talked a lot about Leo, but I want to try something new today. Why don't you tell me what your family was like?" Doctor Shrink asked Mick during one of their sessions.

Mick, who had been looking over at a dirty spot on the wall turned toward the man. "I've already told you about them."

"Only general things." The doctor said. "I want to hear about specifics. You said you had four brothers. What were they like? Did you get along with them? And what about your parents?"

Mick crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair. "I get along with my mom okay. She was...well, a mom." Really, what more was there to say about it? She had been the nice, supportive and caring parent.

"And what about your father?" Doctor Shrink asked, which caused Mick to frown. He had thought that the doc would dig deeper for more about his mom, but nope, on to his dad.

"He's a bastard." Mick said, not even trying to sugar coat it. "Nothing I ever did was good enough for him...nothing _any _of us did was good enough."

"So he was hard on your mother and brothers as well?" Doc wrote something down. "What would cause him to become disappointed?"

"Everything." Mick shrugged. "Not even Dylan, who actually bothered to go to freakin' college, is safe from his judging looks."

"And Dylan is your older brother, correct?" Mick nodded to confirm Doc's question. "Was he the eldest?"

"No, Ethan's the oldest." Mick corrected him. "Dylan came after him."

"What was Ethan like?" Doctor Shrink leaned forward in his seat. Mick shrugged. He didn't really see the point of the question.

"He's bossy. Likes to pretend he's smarter than he really is." Feeling bored Mick tilted his head and looked up at the ceiling. "Ethan's the one who does best with crops, and he's obsessed with time because of it."

The doctor furrowed his brow. "What do you mean?" Mick shook his head. He had forgotten that he was talking to somebody who didn't understand farm life like he did.

"Plants need special care." Mick said. "Different plants grow at certain times. He seriously memorized which crops need to be planted when and exactly how long it would take. It got annoying when he started taking his obsession further than that."

"So Ethan came to take timing very seriously." The doc sounded intrigued by that. "What about Dylan?"

"I don't really know Dylan that well." Mick frowned. "He's always gone, either for school or a job or something, and even when he's around it's hard to connect with him."

"Did he seem detached from the world." Doc asked.

"Yeah right." Mick snickered. "He's so level-headed and organized, he just never tells me about anything."

"You sound bitter." Doc said.

Yeah, because he treats me like an idiot." Mick glared at the psychiatrist. "I may not be a college kid, but I'm not stupid, and I'm sick of him talking to me like I am."

"So you get the feeling that Dylan believes that he knows better than you do?" Doctor Shrink asked. Mick nodded. The man wrote something down in his notebook again.

"And you have another older brother, right?"

"Jamie." Mick nodded. "He takes care of the animals."

"How was your relationship with him?" The doctor asked.

"Okay, I guess." Mick frowned and thought back to his interactions with his older brother. "Sometimes it seems like he treats me the same as his animals."

"But was he treating you like an animal, or was he treating his animals like his brother?" Doctor Shrink asked.

"I don't know." Mick admitted. It was something that he had wondered about before, and it really bothered him. "We still get along though. We used to watch movies together all the time. He may not be as smart as Dylan, but Jamie is such a geek." Mick remembered watching Star Wars with him multiple times.

"And what about your last brother?" Doctor Shrink raised an eyebrow. "He was younger than you, right?"

"Yeah." Mick nodded. "Lionel was kinda a pain. He likes the sound of his own voice, and I swear he doesn't know how to _not _talk sarcastically. He's only two years younger than me but he's so small that he's kinda useless for hard farm work. Our older brothers used to try to pick on him all the time, but I always stopped them."

"Why though?" Mick had to pause at the doc's question.

"I don't know." He said slowly. "I just felt like I should, like I did with Le-" Mick stopped and reminded himself that he _hadn't _protected Leo, because Leo had never existed in the first place.

"I've actually been thinking quite a bit about this 'Leo'." Doctor Shrink said in his serious tone that told Mick that he wasn't going to like what he was about to hear. "From what I've heard, it seems like some of the more distinguishable traits you gave him were ones that belonged to your brothers."

Mick opened his mouth to object, but realized that maybe there was some truth to the man's observation. "Why would I take the most annoying parts of my brothers and put them into one kid?"

Doctor Shrink closed his notebook and looked Mick in the eyes. "Mick, I believe this is simply your mind's way of coping with grief. You don't know how to deal with your family being gone, so you invented a way for them to remain with you."

Mick clenched his hands into fists. "I'm not grieving anything." He all but growled.

"You're still in denial of their deaths." Doctor Shrink said as though Mick hadn't said anything.

"No, I'm _not_." It had been months since the fire had burned down the house and killed his family. "I know that they're dead." How could he think otherwise when he was being reminded of it every five seconds.

"You may know it in your mind." Doctor Shrink admitted, though he didn't sound convinced. "But you haven't accepted it in your heart."

Oh, god. Why the hell were they talking about feelings all of a sudden. "I've accepted _everything." _Why wouldn't the doc believe him and just stop these sessions for good.

"Is that so?" Doctor Shrink raised and eyebrow in disbelief. "Mick, you've been talking about them in the present tense all day."

Mick froze. Had he really been doing that? How had he not even noticed? It had just come so naturally. While Mick sat and gathered his thoughts as he tried to remember if he really _had _been talking about his family as if they were still alive Doctor Shrink took down a few more notes and glanced at his watch.

"I'm afraid we're out of time for today." Doctor Shrink stood up. "We can discuss this more in a few days.

"Yeah, sure." Mick muttered. He forced himself to his feet and numbly exited the room. A guard who had been waiting just outside the door walked him back to his room. Usually Mick would get frustrated with the escort, but right then it barely even registered to him. He was too busy thinking about the similarities between a certain smirking teenager and a number of obnoxious brothers to even think about anything else.

* * *

_Doctor Shrink told me to write down things that I feel would be important to remember. I'm not sure if this is what he was talking about, but I feel like this is important to put out. Future me, if there's one thing you need to remember it's this._

_LEO IS NOT REAL!_

_He's just a figment of your imagination. I haven't actually seen him around for awhile, but I can't get him out of my head. I still can't believe my brain is so messed up that it made up somebody like him._

_Doctor Shrink pointed out a few days ago that Leo's personality is like a jumbled up mix of all of my brothers. I kinda think he was right, but I kinda don't. Leo may have been bits and pieces of all of them, but he was definitely most like Lionel. Their names were even basically the same. I mean, Leo is just a smaller version of Lionel._

_I don't really get why my brain made Leo so much like Lionel. He wasn't even the brother I got along most with, Jamie was. I just...felt the need to protect both of them. Yeah, just look at how well that ended up. I killed my own little brother and wasn't quick enough to save Leo's life...well, not Leo but the real Leo._

_Now I'm just confusing myself. See, Leo had never been real, but there was a scrawny kid who got jumped his first day in Juvie. In my mind that kid had been Leo and I had saved him, but I didn't. I guess I wasn't fast enough to stop the kid with the shiv and Not-Leo got killed._

_This is why I never got attached to animals the same way that Jamie did. Whenever I see somebody that is so much weaker than me I make fun of them for it, and then turn around and protect them because they obviously can't take care of themselves. The thing is, I kinda suck at protecting anybody. Just look at Lionel and Not-Leo._

_Maybe the best way I can protect somebody is by staying away from them, because the thing that they need protection from the _most _is me._

* * *

Mick lay awake in his bed, thinking. It was the middle of the night and he would normally be fast asleep by now, except he had had a nightmare, and even though he hated to admit it he was really shaken up because of it. The nightmare had been the same one that had been playing on repeat for months now. There was confusion, darkness, anger, beauty, fire, and the occasional screaming. It had taken him a long time to figure out what the heck the dreams were even about. Now that he had though, he wished that he could just forget it.

He had lived through the real life nightmare that was probably the worst night of his life, and now he was forced to relive burning his family's house down every single night.

It was pretty much hell.

Some nights Mick was able to fall back asleep almost immediately. And then there were the nights, like this one, where he was too freaked out to even try. So he was stuck waiting for morning to come while his own dark thoughts and memories corrupted his mind and made being awake just as bad as being asleep and having that horrible dream. He needed something to distract himself.

A small whimper broke through the silence of the room, which completely surprised Mick. It wasn't so weird to hear a whimper or even the occasional scream. Lots of kids had nightmares in this place. The thing was, these didn't sound like the usual after nightmare sounds, it seemed more like somebody was wide awake and was upset, which was weird. It was late, and Mick had thought that everybody else was asleep.

Mick sat up and turned towards the quiet whimper. Mick frowned. It certainly looked like everybody else was asleep...except for the small curled up form on one of the beds. They were completely hidden under the covers and were trying way too hard to not be noticed. Mick shared a room with a bunch of kids, only the most unstable ones slept separated from everybody else, and even though it was too dark to see right Mick had a pretty good guess at who was awake.

"Hey, Kid, what's up with you?" Mick asked. The quiet whimpering turned into a short gasp of surprise.

"M-Mick?" The little boy who was much too young to even be in that place sounded so scared. The thing was, Mick had no idea if the kid was scared of _him _or of whatever was going through his head.

"Yeah, it's me, Kid." Mick swung his feet off of the bed. He didn't know for sure what the kid's name was. He thought it was something like Jacob or Jerry, something like that. He didn't know, he didn't care enough to know, so Mick just called him Kid. "What're you doing awake."

"I...nothing." Kid said much too defensively. He was really bad at keeping things secret. Mick couldn't help but think that this kid wouldn't last a second in a place like juvie. He marveled at the fact that the kid had been doing so well in this place. For as whiny and scared as the small eight year old was, Mick knew that Kid was tougher than he seemed to be. Still, there was only so much that one kid could take, and that's why he was in here in the first place.

"Were you thinkin' about it again?" Mick asked. Even through the darkness he could see Kid stiffen under his blanket.

"No." Kid said too quickly, which meant that, yes, he had been thinking about it. Mick sighed and got out of his bed. It wasn't like he was going to be getting to sleep any time soon anyways, so he thought he might as well do _something _with himself. Besides, things never turned out well when Kid began thinking like this, and Mick would really rather not wake up in the morning to find that the boy had tried to suffocate himself with his pillow...again.

"You're really not a good liar, kid." Mick walked over to the boy's bed and sat down on the edge. Kid lifted the blanket off of his head and looked at Mick.

"I wasn't going to do it." The kid muttered. "I was just...thinking about it."

"Yeah, sure." Mick quickly reached out and grabbed one of Kid's hands, stopping him from scratching at his scarred up wrists. Kid had the habit of scratching at his wrists when he began thinking like this. Mick didn't know whether it was because his scars itched or because he was trying to make them bleed again. Either way, Mick knew he shouldn't be doing it. The scars on his wrists were still fresh and sensitive from when Kid had tried to slice them up. That was what had gotten him sent in here in the first place.

The doctors were trying so hard to figure out _why _Kid was suicidal, he had plenty of friends, he wasn't being picked on, his family life was actually good, which was more than what could be said for anybody else in here. Basically, from what the doctors could tell, Kid had no reason to try to kill himself, but he had.

Personally Mick believed that they should focus less on _why _he had done it and put more effort into helping him overcome it. The only thing any of the doctors had done to try to 'help' Kid when his thoughts turned dark was to put him in an isolated room, away from anything he could use to hurt himself or anybody that could say anything that would trigger him.

This method didn't work so well. After just a few hours of being in that room the doctors had brought him out again. They had realized that Kid was actually much more calm when he was around other people. Kid didn't know how to handle being alone.

This was something that Mick really didn't understand. He hated being around people. It always felt like everybody was out to get him, either that or they ignored him like he was beneath them, like he was nothing. Mick would much rather be left alone than be around people that didn't understand him, and that he didn't understand.

The thing was, he couldn't do that tonight. Kid was upset and would likely do something if left to his own devices, and right now, as much as Mick hated it, he was the only one available to help him. As uncomfortable as he was about this, Mick wasn't just about to let Kid do something stupid.

So he sat next to him. Really, Mick didn't know what else to do. Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on how he looked at it, Kid took the matter of being comforted into his own hands. Little by little he moved closer to Mick until he was curled up against his shoulder. Mick grew tense at the contact, but Kid relaxed, and he figured that was what mattered.

Even _if _Mick despised every second of it.

Some time passed, but finally Kid fell asleep. The second Mick was sure the younger boy wasn't going to be waking up he awkwardly and somewhat gently moved the kid so he was lying down again. Mick got to his feet and retreated back to his own bed. He laid down, his arms crossed behind his head as he stared up at the ceiling. One simple thought ran through his head, and it was one that had been bothering him a lot.

Why did he hate and mock some people for being weak, but feel the need to protect others because they couldn't protect themselves? Actually, a better question was, how exactly was he supposed to protect those that needed it? Lionel would have obviously been better off if he had never had anything to do with Mick. But Kid...Mick might have saved his life just by staying awake with him.

So what was the best way to protect somebody? By staying away, or by being there? Or would it be better if he just never got close to anybody? Honestly, Mick wasn't really sure. With how much this place was messing around with his head, Mick really wasn't sure about anything anymore.

* * *

_I haven't seen Leo at all for a week. He hasn't spoken to me for even longer than that. I'm not really sure if that means something or not, but I hope it does...heh, I almost forgot what hope felt like. It's a weird and almost uncomfortable feeling, and I'm cautious about it. I remember how easily hope can be turned into disappointment._

_Still, it's a nice feeling._

* * *

"Are you really going away?" Kid asked as he sat on Mick's bed and watched with a frown as he packed up what little belongings he had.

"'Fraid so, Kid." Mick adjusted his shirt, the one that actually _belonged_ to him, and slipped on his red vest. It had been so long since he had worn his actual clothes, but they felt so good. Mick's vest especially smelled like a mix between dry hay and smoke...it smelled like home.

"Why do you have to leave?" Kid asked.

"Because it's too crowded here." Mick told him for the tenth time. "They gotta get rid of the kids who are better." Mick didn't really believe the crap that the doctors said about him being 'cured'. But he had finished his electro whatever therapy sessions, he didn't seem to be depressed (or, at least not as much as the others in this place) and he wasn't hallucinating dead kids who acted like his brothers. In the doctors' eyes, that meant he was cured, simple as that.

Or, at least he was cured enough to not be their problem anymore.

"Will you be heading back to juvie?" Some teenager from across the room asked. Mick glared at him slightly.

"No." He grunted. "They're puttin' me in a halfway home or somethin'." Which, as far as Mick could tell, would be like a cross between this place and juvie, except smaller and more cramped.

"Will you come back and visit?" Kid asked hopefully.

"Nope." Mick said bluntly. He had hated this place. They had fried his brain and pretended to understand that they knew him better than they knew himself. There was no way in hell he was ever coming back to this place. I'll write you, though." He didn't know what made him say it, but Kid looked so excited about the idea that now he had no choice.

How he had ever gotten this scrawny brat that was almost ten years younger than him to look up to him like he was a hero or something, Mick would never know.

"Mick, are you ready to go?" Doctor Shrink stuck his head into the room. The man had taken it upon himself to make sure that Mick got to his new 'home' safely and that there weren't any problems. He had also made it clear that the two of them would still be meeting with each other at least once a month, which Mick was seriously not looking forward to.

"Not really." Mick shrugged and shoved his hands into his pockets. One of his hands clenched around a small lighter. When Mick had first realized that they had given him back his old lighter he had immediately tried to light it up...it didn't work. They had messed with his lighter so it wouldn't even cause a little spark. Mick was still pissed off about this, but at least he had the lighter. Even if it didn't work, it felt nice to have his fingers wrapped around it.

In Mick's other pocket he kept his notebook. He had thought that it was the stupidest idea at first, but the notebook had kinda grown on him. Besides, he really didn't want anybody else getting their hands on this thing. Mick had written all of his personal thoughts in the pathetic book and the last thing he wanted was for somebody else to read them. He had had his brain dissected enough as it was.

Mick stiffened up awkwardly when Kid gave him one last hug, for '_luck' _or something stupid like that. And, without looking back once, Mick followed Doctor Shrink out. He didn't really know what to expect where he was going, but he just hoped that it would be better than what he was leaving behind.

All Mick knew at this point is that he wasn't going to let himself down anymore. Never again would he just roll over submissively and take whatever shit life decided to throw at him. Because, really, so far life had been dealing him a pretty shitty hand. If Mick wanted life to get better, he had to make it happen himself.

He didn't know what was coming, but what he _did _know was he was going to take what he wanted from life, whether other people wanted him to or not. Honestly, everybody who thought that Mick deserved nothing could go screw themselves. This was _his _life, and he was going to do what he wanted with it.

The world had better watch out, because Mick Rory was out, and for better or worse he was going to take the world by storm...or fire...actually, probably by fire. That was much more his style.


End file.
